


A Gashlycrumb Night Before Christmas

by UnicornPower (baniszew)



Category: Gashlycrumb Tinies - Edward Gorey
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-19
Updated: 2012-12-19
Packaged: 2017-11-21 12:32:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/597810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baniszew/pseuds/UnicornPower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A reimagining of the poem "Twas the Night Before Christmas" in which each of the Gashlycrumb Tinies faces a holiday-themed demise.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Gashlycrumb Night Before Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> This ran away from me and escaped Gorey-level unsettling into Hannibal Lecter-level gruesome. Readers be warned. 
> 
> Trigger warnings: violence, gore, murder, harm to children, cannibalism. Wanton disregard for poetic meter.

Twas the night that poor Amy, she burned with her house,  
When a Christmas tree light-string was gnawed by a mouse.  
Young Basil was hung in the chimney with care  
A trap for St. Nicholas he triggered there.

Wee Clara was nestled all snug in her bed,  
While bushels of sugar-plums buried her head.  
Lil’ Desmond in a snowdrift, he just lost his cap,  
Has just settled his brains for his last ever nap.

Now E is for Ernest, who left with a clatter  
The gift that he’d asked for was pure anti-matter.  
Away went our Fanny, she flew like a flash  
Torn skyward by antlers that caught in her sash.

The moon on the blood in the new-fallen snow  
Gave the luster of Christmas to George flayed below.  
Then what wounds on Hector’s soft sides should appear?  
But bludgeon marks from a sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer.

Now our little ol’ Ida, once lively and quick,  
Was crushed in a moment by ruthless St. Nick.  
More rapid than eagles his coursers squashed James,  
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name!

"Now Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!  
On, Comet! On, Cupid! on, on Donner and Blitzen!  
To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!  
Now dash the kids! Smash the kids! Bash the kids all!"

As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,  
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky.  
So up to the house-top the children they flew,  
All the scared bunch of boys, and the little girls, too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof  
Kate being well pounded by each little hoof.  
Next he split Leo’s head, and then turning around,  
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,  
With pieces of Maud tarnished with ashes and soot.  
A bundle of knives he had flung on his back,  
And what looked like roast Neville, just topping his pack.

Olive’s eyes-how they twinkled! Prue’s dimples how merry!  
Quentin’s cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!  
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,  
And was stuffed with an apple, peeled white as the snow.

The stump of an arm Nick held tight in this teeth,  
Rhonda’s entrails encircled his head like a wreath.  
He wore Susan’s face and her little round belly,  
And Titus he drowned in a bowlful of jelly!

Una fell with a bump from the crazy old elf,  
And I ran when I saw him, and soiled myself!  
A wink of his eye and a twist of Vic’s head,  
Soon gave me to know I had so much to dread.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,  
Choked Winnie with stockings, he tugged with a jerk.  
And puffing a poison up dear Xerxes' nose,  
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose!

He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,  
And through Yorick they crashed like the down of a thistle.  
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he drove out of sight,  
"Gashly Christmas to all, oh and Zillah good-night!"


End file.
